There's still hope...

Secularism comes naturally when geography and economics don't allow it to be any other way - like India where each state is practically a country of its own, foreign to its neighbour in language, culture, customs, food, clothes - there's no unifying factor, no common denominator for "being Indian." Yet, we've lived for centuries in mostly peaceful coexistence. Because of this diversity within our own land, we have learnt tolerance better than any other race in the world. Instances of bigotry have been fewer than you would expect in such a diverse nation with abysmal literacy and employment rates. Being "Third World" has helped to a large extent to make us more tolerant. Economic and societal compulsions force us to share limited space with different kinds of people. There is no money (or MasterCard) to buy ourselves a better life without our neighbours whom we might hate but cannot choose, so we learn to love our neighbours. We're still dependent on one another in more ways than people in more developed countries where money can get you into a better neighbourhood if you don't like your present one. This luxury decreases everybody's tolerance levels. Urban India hosts multitudes of rural immigrants who've flocked to cities in search of better lives. Away from their homes in an alien land, with no money or work, they turn to each other for support. When you don't have money, you don't care if you're a Bengali, a Kannadiga, a Malayali, or a Gujarati; what you are first is Poor, then you're Indian/secular poor Indian who is keeping our democracy alive. While the likes of me will blog about it from within the warm confines of my room, it's the secular poor Indian who is trudging to caste his vote to throw out non-performing elected reprsentatives and bring in new ones; they do it because they have more at stake than we do. To the middle-class Indian, it makes no difference who's ruling. To the poor secular Indian, it does, so while I blog about it, my fellow countrymen quietly walk the talk. That's why there's still hope...